Thing 19 - Other Social Networks

I read the article about Gather trying to become the MySpace for books, and I'm not so sure this will work. Who would go willingly into a new site where the stated objective is marketing? What's in it for the average (non author) user? I know MySpace was originally intended to be a place for musicians to market their work, but look what it has become. Sure, music is still a part of it, but not, by far, the biggest part. Next I looked at some of the other sites. I'd already used WebJunction, for some library training in the past. So I checked out Gather, but, as I've already explained, was not too excited about their mission. Next I tried Ning, and was pleasantly surprised to rediscover that I'm already a Ning user, having joined the James Patterson Community some time back--I even have one friend. I've been a fan of Patterson for while now--Alex Cross is one of my favorite good guys. The chat on Ning's James Patterson Community so far hasn't been riveting, but maybe it will get better. And I get an occasional email update about new releases. This must be one of the reasons Patterson is such a popular author among the young adult crowd--he knows where to find them (online).